


what are we saving for

by tosca1390



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-29
Updated: 2012-10-29
Packaged: 2017-11-17 07:34:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,133
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/549138
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tosca1390/pseuds/tosca1390
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>There is little of the North to impress Jaime Lannister.</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	what are we saving for

**Author's Note:**

> Future fic. For Jordan.

*

There is little of the North to impress Jaime Lannister. 

There is snow; there is wind. There are the lingering ghosts of those gone to better – or worse – ends. Winterfell is rebuilt but still it feels wrong to step in its halls, and he is always on guard. The people watch him warily – those who know of his life story, and those who don’t. He is a lion to them, and always shall be – kin to those who killed their lords. 

Jaime doesn’t care for appearance, really. He is there because there is nowhere else to go – and because he will fulfill his vows, even to the dead. He is there for Sansa, the queen in the North, lady of Winterfell, and he will see her safely through her travails. She is impressive enough for all of them. 

When he made that vow, to a wearied and grieving Catelyn Stark who had iron in her blood and the softness of motherhood in the lines of her face, he didn’t think it would take him so far. Through the breadth and width of Westeros, with Brienne and Ser Hunt at his side, evading the vicious and the tragic, he went. He did not think it would ultimately save his life when confronted with the Dragon Queen, Daenerys Targeryrn, first of her name. Between Tyrion’s calm conniving and Sansa’s resolute disposition, he was spared – but barely. 

Now, he sleeps in the North, far from King’s Landing, from Casterly Rock – an inheritance he never wanted, dutifully given to Myrcella now, as she is wrapped in the warm confines of the Martells. She is the only child left, the only one to call him Uncle and still mean it, despite the rumors and truths abounding. He wears Lannister scarlet and Stark grey, mixing and mingling freely in his cloaks and tunics. There is no one left for him, really, except one he has promised to protect – and she sleeps beside him, a choice of her own making. 

Tonight – all day, really – Sansa has been quiet, subdued. She is empowered here, with the sworn men of her blood and the land here to support her, with the bodies of her ancestors and her family safely buried in the crypts. Her father and her mother at last rest together, and she takes solace in it, he knows. But tonight she has been too soft and silent, and there’s no answer for it in his mind. 

At night, he lies awake, pretending he does not wait for the light steps in the corridor, the soft creak of the chamber door. His golden hand rests on his stomach and he waits without waiting, staring into the stones and timbers of the ceiling. He wonders how it all came to this, with him living in Winterfell, alive and whole, while Cersei – 

He blinks, shakes his head. _Choices_ , he thinks. _We all make choices_. 

There, there he hears the creak of the door, the soft footfall. He glances towards the doorway, mouth curling. She will always come to him, as if she doesn’t trust him to know the way – or doesn’t trust him to come to her. Sansa is a woman now, strong and resilient and sharp as the winters here in the North, but in ways she is still young. He would not have that change. 

“My lady,” he says, propped up in the pillows of his bed. 

Sansa, her dark auburn hair falling long and wavy down her shoulders, raises a brow. Her hands fist in the blue fall of her dressing gown. “We are alone, Jaime. You can use my true name,” she says lightly. 

“Perhaps it’s less fun that way,” he drawls.

She rolls her eyes, coming to sit on the side of the bed. Her hand falls to his, the flesh and blood hand. “You do think you’re amusing.”

He tips his head back and smiles slightly, hair falling across his brow. “Not amusing enough for you today, my lady.”

Her mouth turns downward, eyes darkening. He keeps his gaze steady on hers. 

“What’s the matter, little bird?” he teases. 

She scowls and tugs at his hand, curling her fingers in his. “Nothing. Nothing.”

“I am many things, Sansa, but I am not an idiot,” he says.

Still, she says nothing. He pulls at her hand and she settles herself further in the bed, her hip pressed to his. She does not lie down, not yet. 

“There are days when I do not want to wake up,” she says at last. “I have all that I fought for, that so many helped me win – and still, I wait for my brothers to run down the halls, or my mother to come in and brush my hair in the mornings. Is that not strange?”

His fingers curl against hers. “I think you are in your home, and that is natural,” he says quietly.

“Kind of you to say, ser,” she murmurs. “It makes me feel as if I am a little stupid girl once more.”

“No one would believe it to know you,” he says sharply. 

She smiles then, a slight warm curve to her pale face. “You are a good man,” she says softly, after a heavy moment.

“Please,” he says shortly, “let’s not have any romantic notions.”

“I would never,” she drawls. “I have learned better than that, Jaime.”

At last, he leans in to kiss her, his mouth soft and warm on hers. She is all warmth and hair of flame around him as she curls into him, sitting atop him and kissing him until they cannot breathe. Every moment is sharpened by the cold of a Northern winter, the stones that surround them; neither of them have complete comfort in their respective skins as of yet. 

It makes them well suited in such ways, he thinks, as her lips part and his tongue slides against hers, hot and wet and familiar. He gathers the smooth fall of her dressing gown in his good hand and slides it up over her thighs and waist as she perches atop him, her hair falling about their faces like a curtain. There is familiarity here at last, after years of drifting, loss, war – there are more things to know, of them both. 

“But I would have you here,” she breathes against his lips. His hand slides between her smooth bare thighs. “Lord Commander, advisor – “

“Lover?” he drawls, mouth twisting. His fingers quest into warm dark slickness. He feels the ripple of desire under her skin, the press of her hips into his hands. 

“Such a word for this, ser,” she teases, kissing him again. 

They do not speak again for long moments. It is a small exchange, but enough. 

There is purpose for the both of them here, yet. 

*


End file.
